Tuesday, June 19, 2018

Singer S.P. Balasubrahmanyam and Olympic boxer M.C. Mary Kom are among the winners of V.C. Padmanabhan Memorial Awards for Excellence for the year 2018. The Awards carry a cash prize of Rs. 3 lakh and a trophy.

The awards were instituted in 2010 to commemorate the founder of the Manappuram Group. They are presented every year to eminent personalities who have made significant contribution in the fields of arts and literature; Civil Servant achieving excellence in public administration; public representative achieving excellence in good governance; business excellence leading to development of society at large, and ecology and environment conservation. A new category called ‘excellence in sports and games’ was added in 2018.

Monday, June 11, 2018

Motivated by the Telangana government’s initiative to support farmers under the ‘Give it up’ scheme, many film personalities are coming forward and returning their Rythu Bandhu cheques to the government.

Under Rythu Bandhu scheme, the government gives Rs 4,000 assistance per acre per crop investment to farmers in the State to procure agriculture inputs such as seeds, fertilizers and other inputs. The scheme was launched by Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao on May 10 at Karimnagar, and so far the Agriculture Department distributed 90 per cent cheques to farmers.

The government started a parallel ‘Give it up’ scheme, under which farmers or land owners who do not need the investment assistance can return it to the government. From day one of the scheme’s launch many political leaders and government employees opted to ‘give it up’ and returned their cheques.

From the past one week famous film personalities such as Mahesh Babu, Tanikella Bharani, SP Balasubrahmanyam and Prakash Raj returned their Rythu Bandhu cheques to government.

Singer and Padma Sri awardee SP Balasubrahmanyam, who received a cheque for his 5.37 acres at Solipet village of Shabad mandal in Rangareddy district, opted to ‘give it up’ and returned Rs 23,700 to Revenue officials on Saturday. “It is great support to farmers as they can clear their debts with the investment assistance scheme,” Balasubrahmanyam said.